Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes Comments by Tom Bramwell

score too high.

its a gfx update with some filler and longer cutscenes.
6/10.

if you must have it, buy it for £5 on psx for your ps2. there is no real difference.

all remakes must stop!!!!!

edit: what did Miyamoto and Kojima actually DO on this game? Silicon Knights did the actual porting, they got an outside party to remix the cutscenes... hmmm interesting...

Buy pandora tomorrow instead, at least it tries to do something new.

Grumble grumble mutter Silicon Knights mutter mutter deserve better bitch whine moan grumble waste of talent tch meh.

Nice review.

" leaning up against and peering round walls (a move he invented, incidentally), " - I thought it was Tenchu or was MGS out first?

"if you must have it, buy it for £5 on psx for your ps2. there is no real difference."

C'mon! That's bullshit and you know it. I expect smarter comments from you TM! :p

And not EVERYONE played this game on the PS1.

Oh, and I haven't read the review yet... just wanted to know: any spoilers in there?

Nice game, but very short! I was expecting more from it, I think I spent more time watching the cut scenes than actually playing the game (Very nice they were to).

just wanted to know: any spoilers in there?

Nope. :)

Great review. I'm definitely going to get this as soon as I've made some space in my current gaming pile.

Happy to be a newcomer to this game (though I have completed MGS2) and benefit from the tarted up graphics.

Slightly concerned by the codec overuse but by all accounts the superior story in this one should keep me happy.

It's "ok" but stealth games have moved on to a new level with SC. Snake retired in 1998.

It's a lot harder than I remember it. I had trouble getting into the base, something which I did pretty easily on the PSOne.

Eurogamer once again over rates a Nintendo game.

Same score as Farcry for a remake of a PSX game eh.........controversial ;-)

Nope bullshit

No, it's a conspiracy. We're being paid. PAY ATTENTION.

It's not exclusive, Spong had it months ago.

"As for those of you who cherished the original game? This is the best pair of rose-tinted spectacles money can buy, and a good alternative to the anti-climax of seeing how a once-cherished favourite has aged. If you only have a fading memory of the game you once loved, playing The Twin Snakes is akin to watching an old movie and seeing it the way your mind's eye remembers it, complete with technical improvements you couldn't even imagine at the time.

Tom, truer words have never been spoken. You sum up my entire experience of revisiting this classic in that quote above.
I even nipped out and picked up MGS substance once I'd finished it.

P.S anyone who liked the revamped cutscenes should check out VERSUS
as Ryuhei Kitamura its director was the genius who directed all the new shots http://www.kss-movie.com/versus/

Sort of tempted by this as I never finished the playstation version (got really annoyed at the cheap way it extended the playtime-but that appears to be just me) but then again the original is only €10.....
No problem with re-makes (though putting more in than updated graphics would be nice) the really sad thing is how important this seems to Nintendo. As a port of a very old game it should have been a nice inclusion to the Nintendo line up - not a major release. With the hype for the new MGS starting this all seems a bit sad......

Nintendo knows its fans and theres nothing a "Nintedite" (made that up)likes more than a wayward child coming back to the family.
Final Fantasy was on Nintendo first and so was MGS before they both defected to PSX. It seems silly but I'm sure it makes a difference to those people who refuse to own any system other than a Ninty one.

"and fail to spot you if you're over a certain distance away in the same room."
It's called gameplay balancing. If they saw you miles away it would make the game too hard to be enjoyable. They played with the values of the range of the enemies eyesight until it was chalanging enough and still enjoyable. Realistic? Nope. More fun? You bet.

I have one question to ask. If the guards could spot you accross a section (like normal people would) - and you couldn't get past the first area because you kept getting caught, as a reviewer, would you write something like "although the game is too hard trying to be too realistic. Remember devs, this is a game - fun first."

That's my only complain on this article. Although I did loose the interest one paragraph later ^^;

I did point out that it's only technically a flaw, and that it actually works in your favour...

It's not personal opinion Wopr, it's a professional review.

Not saying I disagree with the review/score, just saying that 'opinion' is a nonsensical and worthless argument to justify something.

I can't understand everyones negativity towards this game. I don't remember people whining this much about the Resident Evil remake.

If you didn't like MGS then, you're not going to like it now. Go play Splinter Cell or something.

I know you did point it out. But it's not a flaw that works in your favor (IMO). That sounds like a bug or error, that the player takes avatange.
It's actually a gameplay balance - to keep the game fun - and avoid getting fustrating.

Hmmm If as a gamer you dont like MGS then you probably dont have a soft spot for stealth games anyway, so Splinter Cell would just wind you up somthing chronic :)

@ Eighthours

So did your parents name you after your mental age ? :)

Yeah but if MGS 2 and MGS TS were to go head to head bearing in mind the person playing has never played a MGS title before which would win? 8 for a person thats played 9 for someone that hasn't.

MGS TS would win against MGS 2 - had the person played it before or not. I hope it's not nostalgia clouding my mind :)

Looks great.

The, so did MGS back in it's day, and it didn't really float my boat then. I'll have to give this a rent and see if it does anything more for me today...

MGS has the better story and characters. Everyone I know who has played MGS 2 agrees that the story kinda disappeared up its own Arse towards the end, plus who wants to play as Raiden? I doubt the game would have had such a great reception on its original release (MGS 2) if we'd known we would'nt get to play as Snake trough the whole game!

Raiden was unacceptable.

And the nakers bit was just VERY VERY VERY VERY WRONG!


You're right though EveryGamer. I doubt it would have sold half as well if we'd had known that Snake was going to play such a small part.

Raiden wasn't THAT bad. And at least they didn't show his wang or anything. ;)

Renzo, thats the problem... he desperately tried to hide his manhood (That is, of course, assuming that pansy actually HAD any manhood!).

It was still just very wrong... ugh. No. *hits head against wall to clear memories of a nakers Raiden*

A couple of comments on the voice acting.

Mei Ling sounds like a fucking peppy 12-year old schoolgirl in this version, compared to the sophisticated person she sounded in the original. They should have kept her light Chinese accent.

Naomi on the other hand just sounds bored, and it's like her lines are just being read out from a piece of paper with no emotion in them. The Colonel sounds pretty much the same, but in this version he pronounces a few words in a different way, and there are some of his lines missing (as there are for all the characters). One thing that is noticable is that he sounds more robotic in this version compared to the original, not showing as much emotion. That may have been left over from his role in Sons Of Liberty, and the VA simply had become used to speaking like... well, I won't say as it would spoil some of Metal Gear Solid 2 for you, but you'll probably know what I mean when you complete that.

Raven sounds better than he did in the first one I think, but again, missing dialogue for him makes his speeches sound less powerful. The one after you beat him in the tank was longer in the original, and he worded it much better. In this one he doesn't have the same way with words that he does in the original.

Liquid sounds great, and a few dodgy lines aside, is better than he was in the original. Ocelot sounds better in this one too, and has a much better accent. Speaking of accents, Natasha sounds fucking retarded in this version. In the original she had a thick Russian accent, but in this one she slips between a neutral accent, a light Russian accent and an American accent. It's annoying... but at least she's a minor character.

Meryl sounds just about exactly the same, and so do Mantis, the DARPA Chief and Snake (although a few of his lines sound retarded in the rewritten script). I actually like Grey Fox's voice better in this one than in the original, so changing the VA in that case was a good decision in my opinion. Sniper Wolf just sounds a little different... I don't really prefer her voice one way or the other.

As for Otacon sounding emotionless at times in this one, I agree. One example that stands out is when he tells you the soldiers in the stealth camo. are in the lift with you. In this version he says it almost like he's telling you a recipie for chicken vindaloo. In the original he said it with much more emotion, and that seems to be a general theme with his performance.

So, really it's a mixed bag. There are some performances that are better in this version, some that are roughly the same, and some which, in my opinion, are shockingly bad (step forward Mei Ling). Some major speeches were messed with script-wise though, which may have been to shorten them for disc space reasons, but every change that I noticed was for the worse. You really do need to play the original and this remake close together to notice the major script differences, but they are there, and they are a weak point in my opinion.

Still a great game though, and one I recommend to every GameCube owner.

"Eurogamer once again over rates a Nintendo game"

"Why is it that you Eurogamer folks have to report every single negative piece of information about the Cube you can find and rarely we see any of the positive ones"

*sighs* :p

The document of MGS2 clearly proves that Raiden has no meat.

i've just started playing the original splinter cell for the pc but also just got metal gear solid
should i play metal gear solid first? seems like it might be a step down after playing splinter cell, i prefer to play inferior games first so i'm not thinking "that other game did this so much better"

templar wizard Wrote:
score too high.

its a gfx update with some filler and longer cutscenes.
6/10.

if you must have it, buy it for £5 on psx for your ps2. there is no real difference.

all remakes must stop!!!!!

edit: what did Miyamoto and Kojima actually DO on this game? Silicon Knights did the actual porting, they got an outside party to remix the cutscenes... hmmm interesting...

Buy pandora tomorrow instead, at least it tries to do something new.


Isn't Pandora Tomorrow a remake? To me a sequel is a remake, funny I haven't got Xbox live but I'm finding SCPT, more of a upgrade than a whole new experience.

I found both MGS and Splinter Cell tediously boring.

Played the original, loved it, just picked this up, still love it.
Camera doesn't bother me, what's more of an isseu is that the game is so much easier. And that's not just becuase of the newly added first person shoot mode.


POSSIBLE SPOILERS FOR NEW PLAYERS!

The game's changed to make it easier, boss fights shortend(Grey Fox fight in lab), certain alarm triggers removed, less soldiers to shoot when it does happen (the run up the stairs in the com tower). Torture-button-mashing sequence so easy and short it's almost silly.

But it's still fun. There's also replay value in the dog tags you can steal from soldiers and the different possible events and outcomes.
MORE SPOILERS:
My brother's also playing the game and he had some different things happen to him, he escaped the prison by being aided by Grey Fox, I used the ketchup to get out and then Jonny had an atack of diarea so he coulden't stop me.
He also had the thermo key stollen by a rat and needed to set a C4 trap to get it back.



/Spoilers over.

So i'm definetly going to play throuhg it a second time, just like the PSX version. If you enojoy stealth games i'd recommend picking this up.

Here we go again. For the last time: convulted Japanese MGS pseudo nonsense does NOT make a good story. Go watch some Evangelion!

What Dizzy Wrote: is almost a story:
Here we go again. For the last time: convulted Japanese MGS pseudo nonsense does NOT make a good story. Go watch some Evangelion!

what's more of an isseu is that the game is so much easier

Eh? What difficulty setting are you playing, as the Extreme setting is significantly harder than anything in the original release IMO.

Freek, I think most, if not all of those things happened in the PSX original game. For ex. the rat thing you said also happened to me, and I had to be running arround, sniper in hand, trying to kill the fucker :)
MGS is one example of a prime game for it's time. Good story, good characters, good voice acting, inovative gameplay, and even if short - different enough in the 2nd and 3rd run, that you actually want to play for better ranking. The rat incident only happened in my 4th or 5th run. I was amused that the game could still throw new stuff at me.

Eighthours, as a writer, all you can give is your opinion. You could try to give your unbiased opinion - but that's nearly impossible for a human to do. MGS script, and backstory (the things snake isn't told nor says, but you find out either by taking your own conclusions - or by readin the files that come with the game) are simply amazing. That's my biased opinion (although it was the first Metal Gear I played - I instantly became a fan).

Moreover the way they integrate the gameplay with the gamescript is still to be matched :)

I'd like to make 2 questions which contain spoilers about the old MGS (the questions are directed at those who have the MGSTS) regarding "puzzles"
-The Psicomantis fight still has the "2 sides of the brain" thing?
-Do you still have to find the box to get the codec code?

Reading the above questions won't be a spoiler if you don't know what I'm talking about. (these are clues given to you to solve some puzzles in the original MGS). Is it still in MGSTS?

Derek: you sound like the guy from the elephant.co.uk advert: repeating the SC:PT name over and over again in the hope that it brainwashes us into buying it.

IMO, MGS and SC are 2 different games: SC takes itself much more seriously and realistic: MGS has more of a story (whether you like it or not), personality and style. Different people like different styles within the genre: MGS is the best in how it goes about a stealth game, SC the best in its method. Almost like comparing Sensible Soccer to Pro Evolution Soccer......

Ok, bad analogy, but you know what I mean.

As a writer, I can tell you that the script for MGS is bad. Bad bad bad. Good game though!

As a gamer, I can tell you that the reason I rate MGS over games like Splinter Cell is because of the story. I played and completed the original Splinter Cell and while its graphics are admirable it lacked emotion and the ability to help the player empathise with Sam Fisher. Plenty of game play is great but not when you dont care why your doing it or what happens to the main character. I cared about Snake and Meryl and even the bosses had their own story and motives. " As a writer" you of all people should appreciate the importance of compelling the gamer or reader to continue, to want to unravel the next part of the plot.

I just found Splinter Cell to be inferior to MGS. I mean how many people do you think will want to buy a remake of Splinter Cell in 6 years time, How many people will even remember it?

The perfect stealth game would be a mixture of the two. A story that's not as generic and uninspired as in SC, but less convoluted and pathetic than the one in MGS. The style of MGS and the tons of cool little ideas that are in there, but the camera perspective, control mechanisms and level variety of SC.

/dreams

As it is, I see the benefits of both games, but personally prefer the Splinter Cell gameplay by a mile.

Have to say, I like both MGS and Splinter Cell. Both are really dodgy plot-wise, but both are quality titles.


...

At least MGS makes more sense the MGS2... was I the only one towards the end of MGS2 thinking, "OK, what the **** is going on?"

Instead of just saying "it's bad" could you guys explaine a bitt more why you think it's bad?

The only thing that seems a bitt overdone to me is that Snake can never just kill an enemy, he has to spend half an hour in conversation with him/her feeling sad about it.

Right ..... Everyone whos played MGS 1 remember back to the 2nd Sniper wolf boss battle in the snow field. Got it? good, remember once you'd beaten her you have the cut scene with Octacon and Wolf asking to be put out of her misery. Remeber how you felt when he stands over her and aims his USP, you know whats coming and you can tear your eyes from the screen, the camera pans up into the barrel of the gun and then BANG fade to white!!!

Without the conversation before hand and the emotion involved that scene would'nt have had half the impact. That is why MGS is better than Splinter Cell. Its scenes like that ,that make you go back for another go like watching a favourite movie.

Derek, your insult implies that my mother only slept with gamers and while I cannot fault her choice in companions ( after all we have excellent social skills and hand-eye co-ordination ) I doubt the validity of your statement.

However she did keep mentioning a Tom Bramwell, somthing about never bothering to call round and see his little EVERYGAMER :)

Who what where what?